Leafs Postgame: Three out of Forsberg ain’t bad

Recently, they’ve had a trend of either getting blown out and losing, or playing well, and losing by a little. Basically, they lose a lot.

By the time it all came down to it tonight, it was a 3-2 regulation loss for the hometown Maples against Nashville. Best-case scenario, I suppose in a lost cause season.

The Rundown

Filip Forsberg essentially put this game out of reach all by himself. By the 5:40 mark of the second period, he’d put himself on the scoresheet three times – once in the first and twice in the second with a trio of goals for a natural hat-trick. The Leafs, on the other hand, scored exactly zero times in the first two periods.

Three goals obviously isn’t an insurmountable lead to come over with more than half the game to go, but it appeared fully out of reach when Ryan Ellis found the back of the net. However, instant replay showed the zone entry was actually offside, calling off the goal.

The Leafs came on strong in the third despite being down three. Josh Leivo, who’s looked good at the NHL level in limited time, earned his third of the year, before Morgan Rielly added a late marker to put the Leafs within one. That was as close as they’d get though, falling by a 3-2 score.

James Reimer was in net for this one, stopping 23 of 26 shots. Not a spectacular performance, but not an abysmal one either.

The Stats

Perhaps this was an example of extreme score effects, but I’d hazard a guess there’s a bit more to the Leafs’ performance in this one other than that. The Leafs did definitely put out a solid effort out possessing and outshooting a Predator team which went into a pretty strong defensive shell following their third goal- but ultimately not converting in the first 40 minutes cost the team a win. It’s hard to really be too dissatisfied with this as a loss. In fact, every Leaf except for Rich Clune finished with a Corsi % above 50. Though maybe Clune had other things to focus on, like a feud with Cody Bass.

Did you see Kadri’s assist the other night? I think he had 2 tonight. Kadri, Rielly and Gardiner are creating a lot out there. Add Nylander and Marner and their numbers will shoot up through the roof. Leivo with 3 goals in 3 games since called up – amazing pass from Kadri who waited just a bit to find Leivo with a guy without a stick on him.

Good solid loss by the leafs in their determined tanking of this season. As the leafs wheel and deal even more, draft picks will continue to increase. However looserville Edmonton seems to feel that they have an entitlement to that number one pick.

Congratulations Oilers on being the number one pukers in obtaining first round pick after first round pick only to find yourself in the basement suite of the outhouse.

Btw a hilarious written article by Scott Stinson of the National Post. He praises the sly old fox Lamerello for his building up of the likes of Polak who he called a man’s man, a guy who chops wood. Phaneuf was described as a real leader. Stinson suggests Lou will insist Parenteau makes the world a better place. He also states the leafs are making tanking an art.

The article also points out that the leafs now have 7 first and second round picks in the next two years with more to come.

Stinson eloquently suggests the leafs have created a situation where with the extra cap space as they start shedding players, will enable them to take on a short term bad contract which means some over paid player joins the leafs for a year and then as a potential free agent the leafs trade him off for another second or third round pick.

Give this leaf management credit for creating a new system of adding more and more draft picks. As I’ve stated you collect enough jelly, some of it will start to stick to the wall as some of these second and third round picks become gold nuggets.

agree I was a stand up goalie brodeur most shutouts standup goalie when drop to butterfly most times stick comes off ice so it becomes useless and how many times have u seen pucks over shoulder.Butterfly terrible on joints as well time to move on as scorers have figured them out.i guess that all those over-priced puckstopper schools wont agree they are making too much money.

we can get a nice return for holland. he was acquired for a 2nd. maybe package him in a deal while he has good value. I don’t understand why the Sharks didn’t acquire reimer + holland instead of spaling + polak… they need goaltending and holland is 10x better than spaling lol! hell, even hunwick + holland > spaling + polak. the Sharks are hilarious.

don’t trade Holland now leafs need big body player system now has cupboard full of small players look at Forsberg last night size and strength still key in nhl. Holland still young don’t give up on him yet that’s what we did with alex steen and it bit us in the $%%

peter holland is not that good. he’s a bottom 6 winger/centre. no where near steen’s calibre. he’s good for now but highly inconsistent, bad defensively and a decent bottom 6 contributor offensively. he’s just a cheap bottom contributor. those are replaceable. they can get a decent haul for him if he keeps playing this well. getting rid of kadri now on the other hand would be a terrible idea. that’s alex steen happening all over again because they’re more comparable in skill than holland/steen.

The Sharks were after Polak. Spaling simply adds some forward depth. While you feel both of these guys are not good players, Babcock would disagree with you. He gave both of them a lot of minutes. Holland is a useful player.

Babcock gave them a lot of minutes to showcase them for the trade deadline not because they’re good players. he obviously pumped up their value for the trade deadline and partly because we have no one else on defence after phaneuf was gone. marlies has no spare d-men and marincin made him look not horrible (he made his possession stats skyrocket despite what many think of marincin. he made him look good and he benefited from the team’s highest save percentage when he was on the ice. must be very lucky). usage has nothing to do with talent on this team. spaling was five. the most even strength minutes. in no way was he superior to kadri or anyone else on the team when his possession and defence were horrifying just because he played the most. there are numerous superior options on the marlies to replace him but the team used him a lot to raise his value, stay bad and let the prospects develop. your comment is foolish. no one said holland wasn’t useful. I said he’s replaceable. he’s been fine but if they can get a good return for him, they should trade him. I don’t see him here when the team is good. he’s a place holder like everyone else on this team excluding rielly, possibly kadri and gardiner.